Melting the Butter
by The JohhnyMcKilt Productions
Summary: Fic for glitteredvixen06.Robert's dead and Johnny's grieving. Oliver's broken up with Enrique and things seem far from fixed. Falling in love is almost a crime.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: dedicated to **glitteredvixen06** who's recently quite gaga over pairings that have to do with Johnny...I hope you like my rendition of one Rachael! ...enjoy!xD

**Melting the Butter**

_**Chapter One**_

They were old enough to read, old enough to drive, old enough to know road safety and old enough to know that it was better not be seeking thrills on the highway where a hundred kilometers per hour was just not up to par.

So why had it happened?

Everything seemed to be painfully over after mere breathtaking seconds.

Robert's Audi had swerved suddenly, as the car in front of his slammed to halt. The German had been unable to hit the breaks on time; moreover, even if he head, the vehicle would not stop because of the speed it was going.

Robert, along with his team mates, crashed into an array of cement road blocks. Consequently, heavy traffic built up that afternoon.

--

Four months.

Four months of nothing like an annoying lull in an uneasy conversation. They went by with obvious slowness with the days and weeks boring themselves into the shattered consciousnesses of the three Majestics their captain had left behind.

It was like waiting for news that would never come.

The world had mourned and it was appreciated. Oliver, Enrique and Johnny had been especially touched when all of their friends from the beyblading world took their time off to be with them during the early period of the loss.

No one ever saw the Blitzkrieg so kind, the Dark Bladers so sympathetic, everyone else working together, being very cooperative.

Johnny was affected the most. Robert was someone he held very dear, the only person he considered being completely stupid with and still appreciated for it.

It was quite horrible and shocking to witness the rapid deterioration of the fiery Scot's sarcastic and quick-tempered attitude. For days, he would shut himself up in his old bedroom in the Jurgen Mansion and not come out till the next day, or when he got hungry.

Enrique was particularly concerned about the redhead neglecting himself. Oliver was exasperated. The youngest Majestics have been having a steady relationship before the tragedy reared its ugly, shaggy head. Now, the French boy acted so lost, pensive and detached, as if he didn't want to get involved anymore in anything that would remind him of their noble captain and best friend.

...which was sad because Robert's will said:

"I leave everything to my team, who, to me, matters the most."

It was signed by Gustav and the head maid.

The end of the other beyblading teams' three week stay in Germany was coming to a close. The last of their guests (members of the other Euro teams) had been the last to leave.

Heavy double oak doors gently slid shut and a certain blonde Italian sighed deeply as he leant against them, slowly sinking to the carpeted floor in exhaustion.

He looked about at the not so messy mess left behind. Johnny had not shown himself since a day and a half. Oliver sat on the fat armrest of the immense couch, staring straight ahead...unseeing and listless, those expressions being the ones he would be accustomed to be seen in recently. An empty bottle of vodka precariously dangled from semi-slack fingers.

Enrique sighed once more.

It just wasn't right. Does the severity of the situation imply that HE would be the one to deliver his very dear friends back to reality?

The prospect of doing so overwhelmed him. For a moment, he joined the greenette in his blank staring from his perch by the door.

Timid servants came and went, leaving the living room spotlessly clean.

Around two hours passed by. The scene had an impression of everyone being turned to stone.

"Are you going to eat?" Enrique asked his mate as he stood up.

When the French boy didn't reply, an umpteenth sigh once more escaped the blonde's lips. He walked over to where his mate was and wrapped his arms around him in a gesture of yearning comfort.

A wounded heart shattered when the body beneath him tensed and a rough palm offered a fierce resistance against his chest.

"No." Oliver said with hard finality.

Enrique stepped back a bit. "What?"

The other boy set his bottle of liquor down on the table louder than he intended. With his back turned to whom he was speaking to, he made for his room.

"I don't want this to continue. I don't want us...to continue."

Tired hands balled themselves into fists. Lavender lilac eyes were shut tight.

"It's all wrong."

Without another word, Enrique was thrown into another invariable pain...with no one by his side...

**TBC**

A/N: The first Majestics drama I did! Review what you think! ...enjoy!xD


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: I'm glad you like it! Thanks for the reviews! ...enjoy!xD

**Melting the Butter**

_**Chapter Two**_

Enrique did not know how to react. A gaping hole in his chest cruelly deprived him of much needed tears.

He was in the kitchen, currently devoid of any of the household help. It wasn't that he was considering the possibility on knives or anything; it was just that the place offered the most comfort in his opinion.

A steadily cooling mug of milk tea lay untouched in front of him.

Quite unexpectedly, Johnny entered the room. Though the younger teen had his back to the entrance, the other boy's activity was heralded by the shuffling of chairs.

"Where's Les Desmond going?" resounded his gruff voice, bearing evidence of fierce crying or the lack of use.

Enrique was slow to react and turn around. "Why? Where is he going?"

Sudden irritation radiated off the Scot in large waves. "How should I know? That's why I'm asking you...I saw him packing bags on my way down. Met him again backing out on the driveway...seemed sad. What did you do?"

The blonde frowned. "I didn't do anything."

He felt Johnny descend on a chair beside him. "What happened?"

Enrique sighed and weakly waved his arm about. "Just like that...over..."

The redhead raised both brows in a sort of nonchalant sympathy.

The silence was deafening.

--

Three weeks.

Three weeks of no one but a morose Scot for company. Three weeks without hearing a word from his best friend. The endless monotone was just about enough to drive him over the edge. Fate was stingy as to not let any events come their way as a hopefully grateful distraction.

Enrique pulled himself together and buried all his unanswered questions in a shallow ditch in his mind, covering the mess with plastic optimism.

He knocked on Johnny's bedroom door one morning.

"Johnny?" came the fearful, reluctant call. "Are...are you awake? May I come in?"

The blonde stepped back a bit and was swayed by a slight gust of wind with the force the other teen used to open the door.

"What is it?"

Baby blue eyes softened and the mouth that came with them was at a loss of what to say. It was clear that the redhead had been crying...again.

"Johnny I..." the Italian stopped, not knowing how to say what he wanted to say. "We...you..."

"Yes?"

Enrique diverted his gaze to the floor, extremely self-conscious of cold, plum hued eyes staring him down.

"We've got to get a move on," the blonde finally blurted out. "Look at Oliver, he seems to be coping pretty well..."

Johnny looked away as his companion lifted his head. "How would you know?" he snapped. "For sure you two haven't spoken since the day he left. And I'd call what he did running away...not coping."

Enrique exhaled sharply. "But Johnny..." His tone rose as he saw tears welling once more. "Johhny please stop!"

The pair entered the redhead's bedroom so that its owner could be comforted more properly.

--

The stars that gamboled across the night sky were as bright as the two Majestics in the immense lonely mansion of the Jurgens were dim.

Neither had gotten a bite to eat since yesterday afternoon.

Johnny had calmed down. Enrique, though worn out, stayed by his side.

"Rob and I had an argument," the redhead sniffed. "Just a day before..." He trailed off, not knowing how to continue. "It's just so damned hard of letting go of what I should have done! What I should have said! So that even if he died any day after that I wouldn't feel this bad..."

Johnny was blaming himself, it was clear. Enrique hated what the boy was doing to himself.

"Johnny...please don't bear any weight. I'm quite sure that wherever Robert is, he's forgiven you for whatever you missed. By now, he should know how much you meant to him. I guess it's quite hard facing the fact that the guy isn't really alive anymore..."

The Highlander was violently shaking his head, though seemingly more composed. "It isn't that...it isn't that..." This litany was soon lost to air.

"Then what?" the Italian was confused.

There was a heavy sniff and tear glazed eyes fixed their hard gaze on summer blues.

"You...why are you still here? Shouldn't you be out with your girls or something? New boys?"

A stone grew in Enrique's throat, making him incapable of replying for some minutes. He was appalled at how his team mate changed the subject and other issues that led to it.

"How could you say such a thing?"

Normally by now, the blonde would be fuming, but the energy had drained from him. "Oliver and I just broke up..." He opened his mouth but no sound came out, still not having gotten over the shock.

"Even though he mightn't consider it anymore but I still hold him dear. I'd become one hell of a shithead if I just walked out of this whole affair and patched myself up like nothing happened! I'm being respectful, John. Besides, your sorry state is screaming that you need someone to keep you in check."

The cool expression on Johnny's face did not change. "So is that what you do to me?" You're acting like a nurse maid to me?"

"Johnny no!"

Enrique wanted to lash out and go into hysterics as this was the hardest of the persuasions he's ever done. "For the past how long I've been trying to get you to move on! You just don't hear me because you're so full of yourself! Heck, if Robert could, he'd crawl out the grave and declare you horribly uncouth for moping around getting depressed about him!"

He was quite out of breath when he finished. His listener was staring at him, looking like a scolded child. Johnny bent his head for a good while before a small, impossible smirk of amusement made itself known on his face.

"I'm not doing anything till you straighten yourself out too," was the placid reply. The Italian's protest was silenced with a shrug. "It's only fair."

--

On the plane to Paris, Enrique couldn't help but be anxious anew for Johnny. After being immersed in a surely distressing emotional state, it was puzzling to suddenly see him up and about going here and there like he was fine already. Being suspicious could not be helped, and brooding made time fly by.

The pair soon found themselves standing upon the crowded threshold of the famous restaurant of Les Desmond.

Johnny nudged his younger companion, who had been reduced to staring at the joint like it would crush him.

The brown-haired receptionist was looking at them curiously through the glass panel.

"What am I supposed to do?" the blonde hissed. "Both of you have to talk," said the Scot.

The other boy huffed and sharply pulled away from the elder teen's grip. "What are you driving at?" he asked heatedly in low tones. "Why the sudden enthusiasm, huh? What do you want to hear?"

"Monsieur Giancarlo? Monsieur McGreggor?"

The pair stopped the one-sided bicker and turned. Oliver's receptionist and sous-chef, Aline, was calling them. She had the executive chef in tow.

The trio met for the first time after a long time. Their faces identically looked like fish out of the water and were stuck that way for hour-long seconds.

...before Oliver promptly turned about and briskly walked back in the restaurant.

"Ah! Monsieur Les Desmond?" Aline was left confused, but she wasn't the only one. Enrique had cried out impatiently and had followed the Frenchman inside.

"Don't worry about it, Aline," said Johnny. "It's just about..."

"...I see."

--

"Oli please!"

The Italian's blood pressure was high once again. "Can't we talk? Why are you doing this?"

He followed the greenette to the doors leading to a steaming, clamoring kitchen.

"I've already told you, Giancarlo, I don't want to see you anymore!"

Despite the apparent noise, the young chef's indignant ejaculation was still hear loud and clear. Some of the cooks in the immediate vicinity turned to look.

Enrique ignored them all and grabbed hold of the younger boy's arm.

"Tell me why don't you want to be involved with us anymore. What's so difficult to you that caused you to call off something as special as what we shared?"

He could not see Oliver's face, but by the force of the shakes of the stiff arm he was grasping, he knew that the boy was crying.

"I got hurt Oliver...but I had to stay strong because Johnny was more hurt than I was."

There was a silence between them, broken by stifled sobs.

"I don't want to hurt you anymore Enrique..." the greenette said almost inaudibly.

The Italian's grip on him slackened. "What?"

In a brilliant whip, Oliver yanked himself from the contact and backed up against the wall, causing more of the kitchen staff to stop and stare.

"I don't want to hurt you anymore!" he repeated in a scream before collapsing on the beige-hued rubber floor in a pool of tears. "What the hell are you looking at?! Get back to work!" he added when he saw their audience.

The commotion died down and Enrique knelt next to his best friend. "I don't understand," he said gently. "Why do this if you don't want me hurt?"

"It's because he's already hurt you. He broke up with you so you wouldn't get hurt any further."

The blonde turned and saw Johnny, aloof and particularly mean. Oliver said nothing, but his sobs increased in volume.

"You were having an affair with Robert, weren't you?" the Scot accused.

**TBC**

A/N: ooooh! Intrigue! ...enjoy!xD and ciAo...


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: **glitteredvixen06**, I am _extremely_ sorry for the delay...this was supposed to be a Christmas gift. Ah well...here it is. I hope you enjoy!xD

**Melting the Butter**

_**Chapter Three**_

"Enrique, please don't go!"

The heartbreaking voice resounded in Enrique's head as he briskly walked out of Oliver's restaurant with Johnny right behind him.

It was still stinging even as the hurt pair sat in silence amongst the green of Luxembourg Park.

The blonde had not cried not uttered so much as a small word. His friend sat equally quiet beside him on that lonely park bench, studying the other boy with woeful awareness.

That afternoon came and went.

**TIME LAPSE**

Johnny woke up with a start.

He had fallen asleep and now the sun was just about to set. Needless to say, his body was aching, but that didn't matter as much.

Where was Enrique?

The redhead stood up and walked about their vicinity in slight panic. He was soon to resort to calling Enrique's name when he found the boy on top of a tree branch, gazing at the vibrant colors of the sky as if he were to do it the last time.

"Enrique?"

Summer blue eyes turned indigo with sorrow turned to him in mysterious fashion.

"Shall we go home?"

A sad smile graced the Italian's features and he gently slid from his perch among the leaves.

Johnny ruffled the cornflower-colored, twig-tousled hair like an affectionate older brother would. "Come on, Glasgow would do you good."

For the first time in hours, Enrique blinked and looked up at him.

"I'm coming with you to Scotland?"

"Yeah," it's native shrugged casually. "If both of us are going to get a move-on, we'll have to start somewhere."

**SCENE CHANGE AND TIME LAPSE**

The short-tempered redhead had never been particularly open about his family. Upon entering the McGregor Castle, though, Enrique could deduce the reason.

"Yaagh!" he cried as four huge St. Bernards leapt at him, each one trying to lick his face.

Somewhere overhead, he heard Johnny's laughter, glittered with some high-pitched giggles he couldn't recognize.

"Charlie! Duncan! Ewan! Mairi! Down boys!"

The Italian gratefully stood up and attempted to wipe the dog drool off him as the animals calmed down and wagged their great shaggy tails by his side.

"Sorry if the dogs are like that," apologized the Scot.

"Are they always that friendly?" His friend was about to shoot him a glare when he became aware of other people surrounding them.

Redheads, ranging from ages four to thirty crowded in front of the double oak doors to see the commotion. The young girls of the group were perhaps where the giggles had come from, for they were still laughing.

"Enrique Giancarlo Tornatore," Johnny began grandly. "Meet the Glasgow McGregors."

The blonde's jaw dropped open.

"What?" He felt like he was facing an entire district instead of a family. "H-how many are you exactly?"

"Twenty-three of Ma's and Da's lively offspring. I've got eleven older siblings and eleven younger ones," was the overwhelming answer. "I'm smack in the middle."

A large number of Johnny's sisters crowded around Enrique and expressed sounds of giddiness and delight.

"So HE's Enrique!" some of them were saying. Most of them had heavy Highland accents. "Ye NEVER bring any of yer team mates home!"

"Would they have to DIE before ye decide for them to meet us?"

One of the older brothers shushed his cheeky relation sharply. "Dinna go shooting yer mouth off with things ye dinna know about! And get off the guest, will ye? Daftie, lass...Wait till Ma hears about ye lack of manners. Be thankful they isna home at the moment."

Johnny sweat dropped as his sisters did not pay attention. His eldest brother, whom Enrique deduced was around the age of thirty, emerged from the shadows carrying their youngest, still around four, in his arms.

"McGregors!" he began in an authoritative tone. "Line up!"

With military discipline, Enrique was relieved of all the redheads, with the exclusion of Johnny, who then presented themselves in a neat row before him to be introduced.

The Scottish Majestic laughed apologetically. "He's my eldest brother, James, and he's carrying little Jill. She's only four," he began.

The blonde smiled in greeting.

"Pleased to meet you," James returned.

"Beside him's Joseph," Johnny went on, pointing to the second eldest who had told off one of the sisters. Enrique smiled at him too and his reply was a curt nod.

"Next there is Jayne, Jam, January, Jacob, Janis, Jean, Janelle, Jerry and June." He pointed all of them out in turn. "Next to June is me," he said casually. "Then there's July, Jeffery, Jelly, Joe, Jessica, Jacques, Jennifer, Joan, Jack and Joshua."

After being introduced, the siblings broke their line and fondled the Italian once more.

"Johnny-boy here's our pride and joy!" Jacob declared with a joyful shout and gave his brother a hard noogie.

"Ow! Ow, hey! You're embarrassing me!" Johnny protested heatedly.

"Not all of us are as famous as him..." added the eldest sister.

Enrique laughed a bit at the look on his friend's face. "Hang on, aren't you guys the well-known McGregor clan? Royalty of the Highlands?"

"There's much more to the McGregors than us," began one of the older redheads. "We're only one glen, or the village a lord (_laird _in Gaelic) presides over_,_ as Granda used to tell us. But our family history is to much of a bother to know..."

"We prefer to be called a family..." explained Jacques in his nine-year old fashion. "We're not ninjas."

The blonde blinked. "Ah. Okay."

"DO come in with us, En-kay! We're just about to have tea!" simultaneously invited the sisters. He had no choice but to oblige and let the large party drag him inside their grand, noble and ancient structure of an abode.

Johnny, along with his two eldest brothers, brought up the rear.

"How have you beeen keeping up?" James asked, knowing full well of his younger brother's grief for the loss of his mate.

"I'm alright now, James," the teen reassured. "We've had it hard and we thought a little distraction might be nice. God knows how we need one, especially Enrique..."

They sureveyed the blonde being tugged and pulled at from all sides as he tried to choose a seat in the immense dining hall. Johnny knew theywere in the same banana, but the playboy would not be as strong as he.

With that phase finally placing itself behind them, where would the wounded Majestrics go from here?

**SCENE CHANGE AND TIME LAPSE**

As numerous as the McGregor siblings were, they all knew how to give their middle brother his own space.

Right after tea, they seemingly disappeared off into the different parts of the castle.

"Come on," Johnny told Enrique. "I'll show you my room."

As the pair ascended a large, winding staircase, the Italian said, "You're brothers and sisters are more than a handful. How do you deal with them?"

"I'm used to it," was the reply.

Johnny's room was large and spacious. It wasn't as furnished as Enrique thought it would be.

The walls and carpet were a faded blue-gray. To one side of the room there was a door leading to a walk-in closet. In the center was a swinging water bed adorned by four plushie representations of the Majestics' bitbeasts. To another side lay a huge sound system wired to a blindingly neon PC. Beside this stood a flaming metallic red electric guitar.

Enrique's jaw dropped open in awe.

"The bathroom is down the hall. Our library's up on the fourth floor and oh! I'll show you something..."

The redhead excitedly grabbed the blonde's hand and led him to a small door that he hadn't noticed before.

It opened up to a small chute enough for one person to slide through lying on his back. Johnny went in first, followed by Enrique. He yelped as its interiors were startlingly pitch black and all he could see was the receding light of the room above.

Quite suddenly, the slide turned into a vertical drop. The pair's hoots and yells blended resoundingly within the narrow cavity until they were abruptly silenced into mere 'oof's and the sound of a deflating bean bag.

Blazing spotlights momentarily blinded them both.

"W-what is this place?" Enrique asked, shakily standing up.

Johnny was beaming at him. "Welcome to my personal training space," he said grandly.

The secret room, if you could call it one, did not have a roof. The results was an enclosure that looked like a cross between a miniature soccer stadium and an aligator pit. The height of its walls gave the feel of a very deep yet wide well. They were made of towering red bricks that opened up to the view of the sky most beautiful at any time of the day. Enrique noted that most of the bricks were scorched most likely due to Johnny's intense practice sessions.

"I could push a button here and my dish and TV would pop out, but that isn't as impressive as what I'd really like you to see..." said the Scot nonchalantly.

Enrique could only turn to him with an expression of eagerness.

Johnny grinned and took the blonde's hand once more, enthusiastically pulling him to an elevator in one of the non-scorched walls of the space and they climbed aboard.

The interiors were heavily padded and Enrique's quickly found out the reason. There was only one button on the panel and Johnny jammed his thumb into it. Immediately, the elevator lurched and shot up at almost twently miles per hour.

In less that a minute, the shaft chimed and its doors flew open, toppling both boys out onto a small, square roofdeck place made safe with concrete railings.

Enrique was laughing as he stood up, amusedly watching his companion as he fixed his tousled hair. "You really enjoy a rough ride, don't you?"

The redhead shrugged though there was an undeniabe smile on his face. "Look around," he said, waving an arm as if presenting his vast riches. "Like it?"

The blonde blinked, momentarily wondering what he was talking about when he pivoted...

...and his heart stopped.

It was quintessentially Scotland...in all its picturesque, glorious landscape. The sky, the mountains, the waters and the green popped out at him like they came alive from postcards and travel commercials. It was simply breathtaking in all the sense of the word.

He was speechless as he walked toward the railing, leaned on it and took everything in.

**TIME LAPSE**

A sad smile returned to Enrique's face as he and Johnny surveryed the mountain-adorned view of a rousing sea beneath a steadily darkening sky.

"Thanks for bringing me here, John," the Italian said quietly.

The redhead wasn't quite listening. "Huh?"

His companion looked at him with a broadening smile. "I said thanks..."

Johnny 'oh'-ed and returned the gesture. The pair was soon lost once more in their own thoughts. The silence was then broken by suppressed sobs.

The Scot sighed and patted the trembling back beside him.

"Don't jump over the edge, 'kay?" he said. "Call me when you're alright. Dinner will be ready by then."

**SCENE CHANGE AND TIME LAPSE**

"Where's Enrique?" was James's first question when he saw his younger brother alone and listless in their dark library.

"In my room," was the somewhat terse reply.

James nodded once and sat down beside Johnny. He rubbed the latter's shoulders comfortingly.

"I may not be the best person to give advice in matter like this but..." He paused as he heard a tell-tale shuddering intake of breath. "Believe me when I say that time is the most effective doctor."

When Johnny looked up again, his brother was gone.

**TBC**

A/N: Disregarding **Walking in on Massages**, I think this is the first time I'm introducing my version of the McGregor Clan. Because they are OCs, and I don't like OCs very much, here are my simple rules for them:

One: Their mom is named Molly and their dad is named Arthur.

Two: There are 23 McGregor siblings. Johnny is smack in the middle.

Three: They have four dogs, namely Charlie, Mairi, Duncan and Ewan. They are St. Bernards.

Four: The McGregor siblings all have red hair and all their names start with the letter 'J'.

...there. Not too flashy for OCs? Are they tolerable? Good. I'm apologizing for any typos because my new PC doesn't exactly have a decent spell checker unless you encode it in its AutCorrect. Ah well...extremely sorry too for it's late release. I hope I'll be able to update this sooner ...enjoy!xD and ciAo...


End file.
